


Supernova

by Man_Who_Sold_The_World



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, Star Wars: Darth Vader (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Pain, This is an Au btw, but people still die, im sad, not sorry, this is tagged as vadaphra bc the ship is so tiny and i know y'all are thirsty for any fic with them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-02
Updated: 2018-01-02
Packaged: 2019-02-27 12:50:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13248603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Man_Who_Sold_The_World/pseuds/Man_Who_Sold_The_World
Summary: When stars collapse, they turn into a void, devouring everything around them: suns, moons, even the very light from the sky.  Nothing is safe from their violent pull, and after eternities of devouring everything around them, they collapse even into themselves.





	Supernova

Leia is unlike her brother.  The Force flows through her, yes, but not always the Light.  She wields her fury like a blaster, wears her grief like a shield.  She joins her father, but not without convictions.  Her father tries to control her at first, tries to command her actions, but she will have none of it.  She will join him, rule the galaxy at his side, but she is not his weapon.  She won’t kill a child, strong with the force, but refusing to join them.  Vader has no right to any other children ever again.  But the slavers, _oh, the slavers_ , she will hunt down every one of them and see them perish in front of her, slowly enough for their agony, but quick enough that she has the time to watch.  Vader tells her tales of Shmi, and it fuels her, the righteous fury that runs through her.  She is the grandchild of a slave, the daughter of a queen killed before her time, the princess of a people snuffed out, the sister of the sun, the wife of the moon, and the stars herself.  From her, galaxies will collapse and form, weary travelers will find their way, and the universe will look up with awe and terror as she lives through the cycles of her life.

\---

  
  
    He hates the name Ben.  It doesn’t fit him, and he’s almost certain his mother gave him that name to spite Grandfather.  His parents love him, he knows, but that isn’t enough.  His mother—he can feel how she’s consumed with the same darkness Grandfather has, how she wants him to have a different life.  His father—he see the fear in his eyes, tries to get him to laugh.  His eyes are worn, lines from laughing, lines from worry.  Mother and Grandfather are arguing again, and he’s on the verge of thinking that she’ll kill him just to have proper control over her empire.  He’s almost taller than his father now, but still, the smuggler takes his hand and leads him out of the room.  He’s saying something, offering to take him somewhere.  He’d go, accept his offer, but it’s never anywhere he wants to go.  Never Tatooine.  Never Coruscant.  Never Naboo.  He shakes his head, and Chewie wraps a giant furry arm around him.  “Ben” is a prince, his claim to the title coming from three separate families.  He wants to wander the galaxy, he and Grandfather even built him his own ship, but he has duties.  He feels a pull from somewhere he can't name, somewhere in the Western Reaches, and his heart somehow aches in its need to find whatever’s there.  He hasn't told anyone, not really.  Not his mother, not his father, not his uncle who burns so brightly with the light that it feels like standing on a sun, not Grandfather, not even Chewie.  Just...Aphra.  He still doesn’t fully understand what her exact role is, just knows that she comes and goes, that she's loyal, that she talks to him like a normal kid, that she talks to him like he’d be _something_ , even without his titles and lineage, that she keeps offering to cover his trail if he wants to run off for a bit, that Grandfather, of all people, strangely finds her agreeable.  She’s never at dinner, but she somehow always manages to be on planet for his birthday, even if his parents can't.

  
\---

  
When he first tells her, the archaeologist, of the pull, the first thing she does is make him point as accurately towards it as he can.  He’s puzzled for a moment before she pulls out a star map and studies it for a moment.  She points to something and wordlessly shuffles around her quarters, looking for something, until she pulls out a datachip.  She shoves it into the wall, and a hologram displays itself.  A map.  She searches through it, zooming in closer and closer until there’s just a sun and the planets around it.  She rattles on about how she knew, how she recognized the star, her adventures in that system.  She turns to him and smiles warmly, calls him kid (it’s somehow different coming from her, even if she has the same roguish smile).  She doesn’t ask him to explain what he feels or why he feels it, just promises to investigate it for him.  She understands how stuck he is.  Sometimes when he looks at her, he could swear she was on the verge of hugging him, he could swear she would if it were allowed.  He understands why Grandfather likes her; why, despite her ties to him, the smuggler does too; why his mother goes to her when she needs help with convincing Grandfather of something.  She doesn’t shine bright, not like his uncle, but she shines with such vivid colors that she can’t help but stain the darkened people around her.  Her face lights up suddenly as she’s speaking, her eyes widen as she glances to him.  He knows that face: she's got a plan.  (He adores her plans. In the past, they’ve ranged from taking him away from the palace without guards, to helping her build another death droid.)  She explains it to him with fervor, explains how she’d escort him when he next had to visit some Outer Rim planet diplomatically, how their guidance systems would “malfunction”, how they’d “get lost” and find his calling, find _whatever_ ’s in that system.  His father was the type to get them into trouble for fun, but he understood the responsibilities “Ben” held, and was frankly too afraid of Grandfather to embarrass the family.  Aphra, somehow, wasn’t afraid of Grandfather—at least not enough in the sense that she wouldn’t risk crossing him once or twice if it meant making him smile.  He thanks her profusely.  It doesn’t matter if it works, it doesn’t matter if they get caught.  She’s willing to do this, to risk this for him, and that’s enough.  He knows he’ll make it there one day, to the place that calls him.  It is his destiny, and he’ll forever be grateful that Aphra wanted to help him get there.

  
When he first asks Aphra exactly what she is to Grandfather, it’s after he accidentally comes upon them in the gardens.  They don’t see him, but he sees them.  They're walking side by side, and Aphra’s laughing.  She’s stuck a few flower stems into the grates of Grandfather’s mask.  He lets them remain there for a moment before pulling them out.  He says something about needing to breathe, and she retorts with something about designing him a new suit.  They talk on that matter for a few moments, discuss the progress of the project, and Ben’s ecstatic.  No one told him that he’d ever be able to see Grandfather’s face.  He remains hidden as Aphra looks about for a moment before saying something that makes Ben blush so profusely that he can feel his giant ears heating up.  He hears Grandfather sigh before half-heartedly insisting that silence herself.  She chuckles and makes another joke, and for the first time in his life, Ben sees his grandfather relax.  This isn’t the serious Emperor, the exhausted father, the careful grandfather.  Grandfather hands Aphra the flowers she stuck into his mask, and Ben hides until he can find her alone later.  Aphra sighs awkwardly at the question he poses.  “It’s complicated,” she says. “And I’m not saying that to avoid your question.  If I had the words to describe it, I would.”  Ben accepts that; he knows everything about complicated relationships.  He asks her if she loves Grandfather.  He knows she must care, she’s not in it for power or money, she never asks for either.  “Yes,” is her delayed response, and Ben accepts that also.  He asks her if Grandfather loves her (he hopes he does, hopes that Aphra, one of his best friends in the galaxy, is loved, hopes that Grandfather knows like he does that she’s worthy of it).  She takes her time with that question before beginning, “You know the story of your grandmother, right?”  She is timid in her approach for the first time in his life.  He nods, and she continues.  “I don’t know if it’s possible for him to love me,” she explains, and Ben does not accept that.  “He loves me, I know he does,” Ben insists.  “That’s different, you’re his grandkid.  Your grandmother, _kriff_ , Ben, she was a queen, a-a senator, he’s who he is today because of his grief for her.”  Ben’s furious now.  “That's ridiculous,” he insists.  “You've been here my entire life, how can he keep you around for so long and not love you?” he asks.   _I love you_ , he thinks.  “I’m _useful_ , kid.  I’m an asset...and a joy to be around,” she tacks on, to lighten the mood.  “He's a fool,” Ben mutters, and he truly believes it.  It’s the first time in his life he’s thought ill of Grandfather, ever.  “Yeah, he is,” Aphra agrees, wrapping an arm around his awkwardly broad shoulders.  “Honestly?  I _am_ a treat; he doesn't deserve me," she continues, chuckling, and he laughs too.

\---

  
Grandfather is falling ill.  Everyone knows, and no one says a word, not even Aphra.  In times of need, families are supposed to pull together.  Luke disappears, Mother busies herself with her politics, and Father busies himself with Mother.  Everyone but Aphra is gone, and although she remains, she’s barely there.  It’s decided that Grandfather will undergo surgery, finally move into his new suit.  He’s weak now, and will be until he recovers.  Mother takes advantage, Luke’s disappearance was planned, and by the time Grandfather goes into surgery, Ben is training on some far off planet.  Away from home, away from Grandfather, away from Aphra.  The voice that’s whispered to him all his life grows stronger as Grandfather's power grows weaker.  Luke’s other students, the ones he must have gathered while he was gone, they stare.  He can’t tell if it’s due to his title, his acne, or the cloud that seems to hover over him.  He still feels a tug towards... _something_ , but it’s competing now with a tug somewhere else.  He craves— (Love? Validation?)   _Power_ is the conclusion he comes to.  
  
He's on the edge of doing...something when a ship lands during his meditation.  He remains in position, working on his discipline, until he hears a familiar voice.  “Kiddo” is a term he’s far too old for, and one that even his father has grown too wary to use.  He opens his eyes, glancing towards the roguish voice with a grin.  He rises, his ever-increasing height towering over her.  Luke stands a few feet behind the archaeologist.  Despite this, Ben steps forward and pulls her to him tightly.  She hugs him back, and he feels as though he's going to cry.   _Weak_ floats across his consciousness, and he reprimands himself for the outburst.  They part and walk together for a bit as she updates him.  Grandfather has stepped down as Emperor, and Mother will take his place.  Ben’s to be there for the coronation.  Grandfather’s to be the head of their galactic army, a position that she not-so-subtly hints will be his one day before he takes the throne.  She asks him how he’s been, looks about before asking if he still feels the pull, tells him he’s growing into his ears.  He could talk to her for hours, but this doesn't feel...quite right.  He asks why she’s here, and she frowns as she considers her answer.  She replies with something about being worried about him, but all he hears is her fear, is everyone's fear.  It simmers within him until his teeth chatter in anger.  He tells her to leave.  
  
Mother’s coronation brings about a disgusting amount of politics and diplomacy.  Everyone there is at least twenty years older than him, and this display of Grandfather’s weakened state sickens him.  He sees his face for the first time, pale and scarred.  Aphra, the liar, stands beside him, and Ben isn’t sure if he can trust any of them anymore.  He’s lost in his own thought when someone approaches.  Red hair, almost sickly pale, thin as a slip of paper; he gives off a kind of hunger for power, the sort that you find in wolves.  The voice in his head, the same one that reveals the truth of his family’s lies, tells him to trust this man.  He’s a lieutenant in Grandfather’s army, sly, smart, has to be to have made it here.  They talk for most of the evening, and though the man sickens him, he's careful not to ruin any chances at an alliance.  He’ll be seeing this man in his future, he can feel it.

\---

  
He’s been listening to Snoke for years, not just hearing the words that seem to float across his mind, but listening.  He doesn’t make friends with any of the other students, but he earns some of their respect.  He hates his name, hates what it represents: his mother’s spite, his father’s weakness.  He renames himself and tells no one.  No one, but the girl he sees in his dreams.  He doesn’t mean to at first, he’s just taken off guard by her question, by her determination, by her gauntness.  He can see just her, but he hears the sandstorm that rages outside wherever she is.  Her tone demands the truth of him, and he wouldn’t lie to her regardless.  He doesn’t.  She tells him Kylo is a strange name, and he’s about to ask her what hers is when something wakes him.  He looks up: his uncle, _his own blood_ , stands above him with his saber ignited.  He calls his own to his hand, blinded by betrayal and anger and abandonment, and doesn't look back.

  
Luke really does disappear this time, and the events at the Academy are covered up.  He returns to the palace, but not home.  Grandfather is dead, and no one there really mourns him.  Not Mother, not Father, and he’s almost certain not Aphra.  He informs his mother of the name change, of his knights; this is all simply business.  They decide it would be best for the changes to come all at once, he’ll take over Grandfather's position with his new name, and he’ll appoint his knights where he sees fit.  Snoke tells him to slow himself, that some things must come in time, that all will make sense soon.  The next time he dreams of the girl, she’s so far away that he can’t hear her when she speaks.  
  
The scandal breaks a month into his new position.  He knew this would happen, that they fear him, think of him as a monster.  If that’s what he was in their minds, then that’s what he’d become.  Mother had contacted her “friends” from her younger years, she had been planning this for years, the Empire was to come to an end.  An end to the Empire just to end him.  He’s told what to do, and he finds it too little.  Nevertheless, he remains loyal and lets the thing play out, commands his armies under their new name, even tolerates the hungry wolf-general.

\---

  
Anyone who says Luke Skywalker is a beacon of pure light is a fool, a fool with no comprehension of the Force.  There’s only ever been one being of pure light, and she's been dead for too many years now.  He watches his nephew train, watches his nephew in his isolation, watches the anger in his eyes, and is worried.  He tells Leia first of his worries, but she’s busied herself with her empire.  In her stead, she sends their father’s companion.  Luke’s happiest moments in life can be counted on one hand: discovering his sister, Han’s return, Mara’s first smile around him, Ben’s birth, and the genuine happiness in his nephew’s eyes when he’s reunited with his friend.  
  
Anyone who says Luke Skywalker has never been tempted by the dark is a fool, a fool with no comprehension of the force.  He’s worried, he hopes with everything he has that the darkness he feels isn’t Ben.  He looks deep within his mind, doesn’t bother with dreams, and goes straight for memories.  In a moment of weakness, he ignites his saber.  He can tolerate his sister’s darkness, his father’s, but Ben’s, oh, _Ben’s_ , is so volatile, so destructive.  His dear nephew will raze galaxies in his yearning, in his fear, in his darkness.  Mara rolls in her grave at his weakness here.  He can be strong, he’s been so strong for so long.  The fear in Ben’s eyes, then the anger, the betrayal: it all burns within him, and no words he can say will ever undo this.

 

He almost feels like he deserves what happens.  Almost.

\---

  
The Empire is in turmoil.  Its Empress, its Princess, its General: well-loved, but recently a traitor.  The next in line: well, rumors pin him as volatile, crazy, he leads their army, separate of his mother and Empire, he claims it has another name, that it will rise separately.  A few are brave enough (or stupid enough, depending on who you ask) to point out the puppet strings everyone can see.  Prince Ben—no, _Commander Ren_ —commands his armies to find the princess, the scoundrel, and the farm boy.  Snoke, whoever the kriff he is, is leading.  He appears from nowhere, but a people as old as the Empire know when to fear a new leader.  
  
So they do, and no one objects.  
  
Well, not no one.

\---

  
Poe Dameron is an unhinged, twenty-something with everything to prove.  The Empire took his parents, and everyone’s beloved Princess had betrayed them.  
  
It’s a suicide mission, her assassination, and he’s fine with it.

\---  
  
Leia Organa needs a confidant.  She can feel what’s coming.  She needs a liaison between herself and her friends, and who better than someone with the guts to try something as stupid as this?  She makes him sit, calls tea, and forces him to listen.  He’s hot-headed (if Han were on-planet, he’d make some comment about her preferences), her son’s age (if Luke were on-planet, he’d make some comment about her attachments), and he’s got personal attachments to the old Rebellion.  It takes two pots and three trays of cakes to convince him of her sincerity, and by the end of it, he's calmer, and on her side.  She asks him about his skills, and his sly grin reminds her of her dear husband.

\---

  
The bounty on the fabled trio’s heads continually grows higher and higher as their locations remain unknown.  Everyone from his past life is gone, either scattered or dead.  
  
Everyone but the girl, and Aphra.  
  
The girl only occasionally appears to him, always in his sleep.  She’s older now, luckily less gaunt, and still he knows not her name.  
  
Aphra...Aphra is a different matter.  When he overtakes the capital, his soldiers clear the entire palace.  He doesn’t bother with the sentiment of it all, only even there for the image of new power taking over the old.  He and the pale general take their own quarters, Snoke has taken the throne.  The security of the place is supposed to be impenetrable.  
  
That’s never stopped Aphra before.  
  
She’s waiting in his room when he enters.  He would draw his saber if it were anyone else.  He calms himself here, grinds his teeth to keep himself from doing anything with the pent-up emotion her presence brings.  She was loyal to Grandfather until his end, after it.  Never there for power or money, just out of loyalty and affection.  Before he can ask anything, she answers.  Her loyalties extend beyond Grandfather, to him, she offers her skills, her council.  He should reject it, reject her and strike her down, but before he can consider anything other than hugging her, she says something that seals her fate.  
  
“Have you told him of the girl?”  
  
He ignites his saber, and she flinches ever so slightly.  
  
“You’re afraid of me,” he states simply.  
  
“I was afraid of your grandfather too, kid.”  
  
“...What was it you had asked of him when you two first began?”  
  
Aphra smiles grimly.  “Lightsaber, right through the neck—”  
  
“—No warning, nice and quick?”  
  
“Yeah, that line.”  She steps forward.  “This isn't right, Kylo,” she whispers.  She uses his _name_ .  She’s always been like that, always knew what _he_ wanted, not what others wanted from him.  “Remember the promise I made you?” she asks, and his saber disappears back into its sheath with a muted crackle.  
  
“Which one?” he asks.  
  
“The one about sneaking you away to find your destiny.  I promised you I’d take you there.”  
  
“I’ve found my destiny.”  
  
She shakes her head.  “No, you haven’t.  Let me fulfill my promise,” she insists—doesn’t plead, _insists_ .  His saber remains off as he steps forward, enfolding her in a tight hug.  “You're just like your Grandfather, you know that, kid?” she asks, and he raises one of his hands to hold her at her shoulder.  She doesn’t even blink when his saber ignites, cutting through her neck.  No warning, nice and quick.  
  
“You didn’t know him very well,” he mutters as he slowly sets her body on the ground.  He grinds his teeth again, trying to keep himself from crying out.  He feels a kind of cold creep over him, hears a voice that isn’t his praise his action, and hears a voice that is crying loud enough to block it out.  
  
Han’s death, in comparison, is easy.

 

\---

  
  
FN-2187 has always been too compassionate, too hopeful, too sentimental to be a leader.  He’s the type to try and save a comrade, the type to try and avoid hitting innocents, the type to outright refuse, even if he does so quietly.  
  
It’s the quiet ones you have to watch out for.  
  
He meets a pilot the moment he decides he needs one, and the whispers of the _force_ he’s heard begin to ring true.  This pilot is his destiny, his future, and it all begins with a name: Finn.  
  
Finn is compassionate, hopeful, sentimental; it’s what makes him a good hero.  His thoughts lie with Rey, his actions done with the ferocity of a man protecting those he loves, and he does.  The Order’s new weapon doesn't stand a chance against the hope he’s wrought, and neither does the Order itself.  He loves deeply, and it’s not until he meets Rose that he realizes that’s his greatest strength.  He’ll fight Kylo Ren, Captain Phasma, the whole damned galaxy if it means saving what he loves.

 

\---

  
Rey never considered herself to have an active imagination, but when she dreams of the boy, it’s the only conclusion she can come to.  She feels warm when she meets Finn.  After their initial greeting, he makes her smile, he’s nice, and he’s the first real person she’s ever met who doesn’t expect something from her.  There’s no trade, no exchange of one thing for another.  The only thing he expects of her is friendship, and even that only comes on her terms.  Still, she has to go back.  Gone for too long, and she’ll miss them.  He thinks she’s crazy for wanting to go back, thinks there’s nothing there for her.  But really, what is there ahead of her?  
  
There are several answers to that question.  
  
There’s Han Solo, who after ten seconds of knowing her gave a damn.  There’s Finn Stormbreaker, who half-lies to The Resistance just for a shot of saving her.  There's the rage she feels when she watches Han die; the righteous fury that flows through her as she stalks towards the wicked offender; the knowledge that, if left alone, she might have killed him.  There’s Leia Organa, who gives her a tracker and hugs her (like her mother should have, but she suppresses those thoughts).  There’s Luke Skywalker, who is neither myth nor legend, but instead the embodiment of the truth of the force.  There’s Ben Solo, the embodiment of what happens to the lies.  There’s Poe Dameron, who looks at her like she’s the sun, and looks at Finn as though he is the moon.  Who that makes the stars, she does not yet know.

 

\---

  
  
When she first met him in the forest, he was a stranger.  Saber in hand, cloaked in black.  He looked the image of death, but of whose death, she wasn’t yet sure.  
  
Not hers though, strangely enough never hers.  
  
When she had met him in her dreams, she thought him odd.  His face, his voice, his name, all odd.  When she hears the stories of him later, when she discovers exactly who he is, she realizes she’s never known him as Ben, even if she knew him long before he was Kylo.  In the forest, she fights, not for her life, but to avenge Han’s.  She fights him wildly, like a beast.  A hungry beast who's been starved her entire life, only to have the one thing she craved taken from her in hatred?  No, spite?  No, something else.  But the reason does not matter.  She fights like she’ll kill him, wants to, but his luck seems to hold out long enough, and she’s forced to leave him lying there, bleeding and scarred.

 

\---

 

She's different in real life, he realizes. Hungrier, wilder, like an untamed beast in her rage. Somewhere in his head, he considers the fact that so is he. In their dreams, he was always calmer, softer. (Whether it was the sleep or her that did that was anyone's guess.) He likes her like this though, she stalks him like a predator ready to strike. What a wonderful thing it would be to be her feast. Neither of them address the dreams when he's searching through her mind. Neither of them address the dreams when the force binds the two, flowing through them like a river in a canyon. It runs through them like it's been there forever, like it's worn through the both of them for eons until a deep chasm was made in the both of them.

 

 

It's the connection after she tries to shoot him that they talk about the dreams. She asks him why he lied about who he was, but he didn't. Always open as a wound with her, always honest. He's never lied to her, and he's not about to start now. She asks him about Han, and that _hurts_. That wound is still festering, and he's not sure what hurts more: killing Han, or the affection his father held for some scavenger he never even knew. 

Still, he looks forward to their talks.

 

\---

  
Snoke is dead.  Nothing should be motivating Ben to act like this, nothing but his own stubborn need to see every little thing through to its end.  Sometimes Leia—yes, Leia, the Empress, Princess, General, daughter of Darth Vader, daughter of Anakin Skywalker, of Padme Naberrie Amidala, of Bail and Breha Organa—wonders if Ben inherited the worst of her and Han alike.   _Kriff_ , Han.  She hasn’t even had the time to grieve her husband properly.  It’s hard to process, that the person she loved most was killed but the person he loved most.  She feels like she needs to take a seat, take a nap, go into a coma again.  Something just not to feel everything in. all her life, Leia’s been accustomed to losing people: her mother, her people, her parents, Ben, but she never really grieves, just lets her grief fuel her.  
  
It’s exhausting.

\---

 

He’s asleep, having collapsed in his quarters from exhaustion, when she finally opens the bond again.  In his dreams, he doesn’t look tired, doesn’t look dejected, doesn’t look lonely.  He can tell she won’t be here for long, so he asks her why she’s come.  She asks him about Mother, about why he didn't love her.  That assumption’s wrong, he loves his mother plenty, but it isn’t enough.  Still, his scavenger is curious, and he can’t find it within him to not oblige her.

  
“She waited until Grandfather was weak to send me away, planned it that way.  She took his power and only let me come home to watch.  She didn’t want me to fall to the dark, the hypocrite...she never told you the way it was before the Resistance, did she?  How she turned to the Dark, how she was satisfied with the powers that came with The Galactic Empire, how she did Grandfather's bidding...all, if you believe her, to protect Han and Luke...but she enjoyed it.  I would know: she liked it better than me.  She knew I would grow powerful, did everything in her power to stop me, regardless of it were my place or not...”  He sighs.  When he felt himself falling asleep, he was actually glad for the rest, but there would be no rest here.  He turns from her, rubbing at his face.  
  
“Who was Aphra?” she asks, and before his emotions can get the best of him, he’s wrenched from his sleep by a nervous lieutenant.

\---

Never in his life, until he’s tempted by Rey, does he see the ghostly woman before him.  She’s young, far too young to have died, and her light is that of a blinding, righteous purpose.  She shines warmer than Luke did, but he can feel the similarities all the same.  She has Mother’s eyes, Uncle’s smile, his despair.  He asks why she’s come, and she does not give him a reply.  Instead, her short form seems to tower over him till he takes a seat.  He can feel her disappointment, but more than that, he can feel her pity.  
  
He can’t tell which is worse.  
  
He has long since realized how wrong Snoke was, how weak Grandfather really was, how weak he will be if he follows in his path.  His mind is stuck in all this when he first hears her voice.  
  
“Your grandfather’s greatest strength was his love for you all,” she begins simply, and her voice tears through him.  
  
“And his greatest weakness was his love for you,” he retorts, not letting himself look up until she places a hand upon her shoulder.  
  
“His greatest weakness was giving in to his fear.  It cost him everything,” she warns. “And it will be the same for you.”  
  
“I fear _nothing_ .”  
  
“You fear losing her for good, just as he had.”  
  
“She’s _nothing_ , a desert rat.”  He doesn't believe a word he says.  
  
“You grandfather was a slave,” she replies.  “And I a Queen...fitting, isn’t it?  You mother was always afraid that you had too much Vader in you.”  
  
“They were _always_ afraid!   _They_ were the ones consumed by fear!”  
  
“They were worried.  There’s a difference, Ben.”

 

(There are two people in the galaxy that can call him that without infuriating him, and tragically only one of them is alive.)

 

“And they were _wrong_ .”  That turns his head.  “You didn't have too much Vader in you.  They should have told you the truth of it all, of your past.  They made mistakes.”  
  
“They were weak, pathe—”  
  
“Do not insult them!” she snaps, and he feels the righteous light of her burn him.  “Not when I’ve had to watch my family die for decades.”

\---

His mother is a hypocrite, he knows.  Her words ring around his head almost violently.  With just the pull of two fingers, Snoke is dead.  
  
He’s far gone from her when he first hears her advice.  
  
“Never take pleasure in killing, Ben.  Take pleasure in the knowledge of the suffering it will alleviate, but never the act.”

 

He scoffs at her: it is one of the few ways he can still interact with his mother.  “I’m sure you only took pleasure in the suffering that Tarkin’s death would ‘alleviate’.”  
  
“Learn from my mistakes, Ben; don’t punish me for them.”  
  
He takes great pleasure in killing Snoke.  At times, he could honestly care less about what his master put him through, but the scavenger was _his_ , and he refuses to share any of her.  Not her anger, not her pain, not her righteous fury.   _None of it_.

\---

Han Solo, the Scoundrel, doesn’t mind that his son outranks him the moment he's born.  Doesn’t mind that to be with the woman he loves is to tolerate the man who has tortured them both.  Doesn’t even mind when he’s made a general in an army he doesn’t believe in.  
  
It’s all worth it, for his family.  It’s the one he made, after all; scoundrels don’t exactly come from good homes.  Luke shines, still the bright farm boy; Leia’s dimmer, something she agreed to do to protect them both; Vader is...well, Vader.  
  
Ben is a void.  
  
Where his wife was dark, his son is a vacuum of light.   _Darkness_ does not describe it.  
  
Han had always thought he was just lucky, but with the family into which he’s stumbled, he’s starting to think that “the Force” is more than just a Skywalker trait.  
  
Ben attracts his uncle’s light, Aphra’s color, Han’s everything.  Even Vader, who Han had thought to be long removed from any kind of actual love, has to have his respirator recalibrated after he looks upon his grandson.

\---

Ben is the grandchild of a Sith slave, the son of a princess dead before her time, the leader who snuffs out entire people, the lover of the sun, the foil of the moon, and the stars himself.  From him, galaxies will collapse and form, weary scavengers will find their way, and a universe will look up with awe and terror as he lives through the cycles of his life.

  
When stars collapse, they turn into a void, devouring everything around them: suns, moons, even the very light from the sky.   _Nothing is safe from their violent pull, and after eternities of devouring everything around them, they collapse even into themselves_.


End file.
